Dear Realtors: Go Take A Vacation (In So Many Words)

We know we’re not alone with these types of emails, but like always, we share!

Thank you so much for all your help looking at places around the city. We were so excited about both 655 5th St and 1930 Mission St, but we’ve come to realize that financially it just doesn’t make sense for us right now to be buying anything. They started handing out pink slips around both our workplaces again and it got us thinking about what would happen if either of us should lose a job after we closed on a place. What would happen? We’d have no savings left because it would all have gone to a down payment and we’d probably be unable to make the monthly payments pretty quickly. While the economy continues to suffer, it seems like this would be just to big of a jump for us to take. For now, we’ll continue to put whatever money away that we can, and hopefully things will turn around in the next year and we’ll be in a better position to really start looking again. It was great working with both of you so hopefully we will be able to again soon. Thanks again, and all the best.

Should you be so inclined to attempt to reach us, first try Alta. If you can’t find us there, maybe the Bird. No luck, get a peeps and look in the Wasatch backcountry. Still no luck, try the Wood, and maybe even play paparazzo at Squalleywood! We’ll be around. Come join us!

Actually I should have said don’t rely on your pieps. Rely that your peeps know how to use their pieps and can find and dig you out quickly.

A lot of peeps don’t even have pieps and even the peeps who have pieps don’t know how to interpret the peep sounds that their pieps makes.

Better yet, steer clear of avalanche prone slopes and stay out of the debris traps. You have only a 50% chance of survival of the initial slide, and that is before your peeps start clamoring around with their pieps, shovels, and probes.

…of course it is a time to buy!!! AND while the concern people have about “Pink Slips” is a legitimate concern I ask you to consider this….Would you not do the exact thing if renting? Would you not get another job / find a way to make your bills…..? There is opportunity here for everyone IMHO :)

Lola – aren’t the monthly cash requirements for owning significantly higher compared to renting ? So if you lost your job, your cash reserves would hold you over 2 or 3 times longer renting vs. owning.

Also if you look at the pink slip blizzard as part of a larger economic situation that includes further declining home prices then owners risk losing their down payment. That’s a risk that renters are not exposed to.

Losing a job is a bummer. Losing a job with a large investment (down payment) at risk really a bummer.

With a clear understanding that your communinties pricing is different than mine, I can not be certain what your cost differences are with renting vs. buying. My view, since I bought this year in a “declining market”, is that my home cost is about $4800 more annually. With that said, I will more than see those dollars back in my taxes :)

As well, I do not have any risk of loosing my down since I have zero plans to sell during this down turn. I bought with a clear understanding that we were still in the down turn and that would have zero impact to me long term relative to my home purchse.

Real Estate is MY investment LONG TERM….I realize it may not be everyone’s choice I just dont understand why….

sure for some random definition of long term, it might be 5 years, 10 years or 15 years. If you found a place that you like and was comparable to renting then congrats to you. I haven’t seen any place like that in SF or on the peninsula.

You can always use the nytimes rent vs buy calculator to see if makes sense for you. The only way it made sense for me was if house prices were going to increase significantly in the next decade. So I’ll continue to rent.

A professional architect trolling real estate web sites looking for spelling errors so he/she can post condescending remarks about said spelling errors is pathetic. Noearch has the ability to invoke thoughtful arguments, but instead his/her posts have become nauseating and/or pointless, like the useless “losing” post above.

There is such a word as loosing. Think, “loosing arrows” for one. To wit, we at The Front Steps continually deal with a barrage from one self-styled copy editor, loosing his unwanted, unnecessarily, and snarkily negative correction barbs on informal web postings. He does this in between Victorian architecture fan club meetings, anti-realtor public service announcements, and build and design firm witchhunts.

So, really now. Any copy editor worth his salt would know that loosing is indeed a word. Since you are obviously not a copy editor of any worth, can we ask you to knock it off? Everyone makes mistakes in Web postings. You are only painting yourself as an uptight misanthrope.

I agree with Fluj– typos are pretty common, folks. Can any of us say in honesty we don’t make them? For instance, you can’t have ONE with THEIR, noearch, as you do in your last critique (you’d need his/her). I’m sure your hand just slipped. Such snafus, we agree: pretty common.

Now to address the actual content of the post itself…. enjoy your vacation, Editor. I’m thinking you might return to more of the same, but you never know. 2009 is a whole new year. So, hey! Happy/merry new year to everyone!!

I am certain I have tons to learn since I am a 1st year homebuyer. The differences with our location contribute to some $$ differences that I must not be exposed to…as well, the details of are purchases are structured differently. I am convinced I am missing something relative to your numbers but I am not sure that it has to do with what I wanted to share to begin with…

I don’t live anywhere near SF. I live at 1.7 Ocean and with any luck I will be at 12@Elden before June 2009 (OC) because I want to buy and don’t care when Godot is coming :)

I am not waiting for the bottom to hit and really just wanted to encourage anyone to consider asking themselves what THEY were waiting for…